Living in Big Cities is Bad for Your Mental Health and Decision Making

 "I think our governments will remain virtuous for many centuries; as long as they are chiefly agricultural; and this will be as long as there shall be vacant lands in any part of America. When they get piled upon one another in large cities, as in Europe, they will become corrupt as in Europe." - Thomas Jefferson in an 1787 letter to James Madison.

 2012 Presidential Results by County, in a state won by B. Obama with over 57% of the vote. Note the concentration of votes in counties with large urban areas, a pattern which repeats in other states.

An article in the Boston Globe presents powerful evidence that city life impairs people's judgement.   The overwhelming amount of stimuli wears down people's filtering mechanism.   It makes their brains 'tired'.   The result is that they perform worse on various aptitude tests.  They are more aggressive, more impulsive, and in short, have worse judgement.    A hectic environment does not allow them to think things through like they would be able to in a small town or more rural setting.    As a writer, I can vouch for the power of peaceable settings to contribute to one's work.    

Liberalism offers quick, loud, direct fixes to individual's troubles.   These solutions are unworkable, but they seem superficially plausible to people who don't have an opportunity to meditate on consequences.   This makes liberalism appear more attractive to city dwellers than it would be if those same people were granted the luxury of considering the long range viability of those ideas in a more down-to-earth small town or rural setting.    

Did blacks vote overwhelmingly for Obama because he was black?   Maybe, but not just urban blacks voted for Barack Obama, virtually every group in major metropolitan areas voted for him.   Romney was a wretched candidate of course, but pick any election.   The big city population, overwhelmed with sensory stimuli, go for the alleged quick fix of big government while the rural areas eschew it.  

Big cities tend to vote for big government.   The presumption of our big-city based media is that this is because 'with it' city folks are just so much smarter than rural yokels who don't appreciate the government's power to run your life better than you can.     I am suggesting the reverse may be true.   It's almost like the Star Trek Episode of The Could Minders in reverse.    In the story, the Trogs were not really inferior to their upper castes, but rather something in their environment made them impulsive, aggressive, and less capable of reflective thought.    The main difference between this TV episode and America; its not the lower class that has impaired cognitive abilities, but the people running the country!

People who live in cities tend to have less time to think and ponder, but now the majority of of population is living in that condition.  But it gets worse, environmental stupidity has achieved escape velocity as government policies now favors herding people into cities and chasing them out of rural areas.     Mass transit is subsidized at the expense of private transportation.  Cites get bailouts, grants, and subsidies not available to rural areas (not that they should be available to anyone).    Agenda 21 is focused on depopulating suburbs and rural and small town areas, in favor of stacking people like cord wood in "sustainable" high-rise densely occupied communities.  

Advances in technology enable people to live more spread out than ever before.    Increasing concentration of the population is no longer being driven by technology, but rather by flawed government policy.    Democracy is no guarantee of good government, especially when virtue and good judgement are eroded, as predicted by mega-genius Thomas Jefferson.     How much longer will the minority in small town and rural America accept the decisions of "leaders" elected by people whose judgement is impaired?